Army ranger says his friendly fire might have killed Pat Tillman

Nearly a decade later, a ranger in the United States Army now says he may have been the soldier that fatally shot professional football player-turned-corporal Pat Tillman in Afghanistan.

The April 22, 2004 incident remains to be one of the most
discussed moments to occur during the longest-running
American-led war ever: Tillman abandoned his high-profile career
with the National Football League to join the US Army in
aftermath of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, only to be
killed in southeast Afghanistan after a colleague accidentally
opened fire.

Initially, the US military blamed Tillman's death on a group of
insurgents. The soldier was killed “in the line of
devastating enemy fire,” the Army said in an official
release, but quickly after acknowledged in secret that friendly
fire gone awry was likely to blame. It eventually became the
subject of a congressional investigation and propelled the
incident into the national spotlight.

Speaking to ESPN for an interview that aired over the weekend on
Sunday, Steven Elliott said he believes he may be the one
responsible for Tillman's death.

"It is possible, in my mind, that I hit him," Elliott
told the sports network for what was his first time publicly ever
discussing the incident.

"It would be disingenuous for me to say there is no way my
rounds didn't kill him, because my rounds very well could
have,” he said.

During the 2004 tragedy, Elliott says he was equipped with an
M240 Bravo machine gun. Mike Fish for ESPN wrote that the
soldiers were roughly 100 yards apart when Elliott and two others
opened fire at Tillman after mistaking a man next to the former
football star for an adversary. The other suspected shooters,
Fish wrote, declined to comment.

“Tillman's group, which had traveled ahead, scaled a
ridgeline to provide assistance to fellow Rangers under
attack,” Fish wrote. “But a squad leader, Sgt. Greg
Baker, in Elliott's armored vehicle misidentified an allied
Afghan soldier positioned next to Tillman as the enemy and opened
fire, killing the Afghan and prompting Elliott and two other
Rangers to fire upon what Elliott called shadowy images, later
learned to have been Tillman and then-19-year-old Bryan
O'Neal.”

"The mantra is that when all else fails you do what your team
leader does, you go where your team leader goes and you shoot
where your team leader shoots, and so effectively ..."
Elliott recalled during his recent interview with ESPN.
"Effectively him firing at that position is, is the same as
his giving an order to fire. ... And it breaks my heart to say
that, because I know that he regrets that -- so much."

Now 33, Elliott told ESPN's Outside the Lines program that he
left the Army in 2007 and has since been treated for
post-traumatic stress disorder as a result of his service. By
speaking up, he said, he hoped he'd inspire other veterans to
seek help.

According to the US Department of Veteran Affairs, as many a
20 percent of Iraq and Afghanistan War vets
suffer from PTSD.